Each NHL team’s top breakout candidate for the 2019-20 season

Florida Panthers – Frank Vatrano

Before the 2018-19 season, Frank Vatrano was known as an intriguing player, but one who had never had consistent success in the NHL. The Florida Panthers traded for him at the 2018 trade deadline and he rewarded them with the first 20 goal season of his NHL career.

Vatrano was a smart guy to bet on because of his ability to generate shots. Most skills don’t have a high translation rate from the AHL (or any other league) to the NHL, but shot generation tends to be a universal language, so to speak.

Last season, among the 361 forwards with at least 520 minutes at five-on-five, here’s where he ranked in some key stats. All stats are at five-on-five.

• Goals per hour (1.06) – 44th
• Shots on goal per hour (10.38) – 12th
• Individual expected goals per hour (0.86) – 24th

Vatrano is a fairly one-dimensional player. He’s not much of a playmaker, though his passing is a bit underrated. Vatrano doesn’t stand out defensively at all, though neither do most wings (you’d be surprised how many wings are former centers who struggled defensively).

However, the one dimension to his game happens to be a very valuable one – shooting the puck. Vatrano has the potential to be a 30+ goal scorer, especially if he continues to get consistent minutes in the Panthers top-six.